Genital Herpes tips

[soembarassing1]

I’m so embarrassed typing this. Oh I’ve also named changed.

I was diagnosed with HSV2 nearly 20 years ago and I can count on one hand the amount of outbreaks I’ve had. My problem is that for a few months at a time, I constantly feel like I’m about to have an outbreak. I think it’s called prodromal symptoms. I can feel like an ache in my skin or sunburn anywhere from the bottom of my back down to my feet.

Anyway, in an attempt to stop these prodromal symptoms, I have started suppressive therapy with antivirals a few days ago.

At the moment I feel like my left labia has a burning prickly feeling. Can anyone who also uses this medication in this way advise on when the symptoms might go away?

Hopeful bump

I would stop drinking alcohol for a few months while the treatment gets it under control along side your immune system. I’ve been taking suppressive treatment for a while now and only get prodrome when I’ve had a drink x

Thanks for the tip @violetcuriosity.

how long have you been on suppressive medication if you don’t mind me asking? And what are your prodrome symptoms?

Hi

I've been on a high dose of suppressive antivirals (500 mg valacyclovir once a day) for 18 years. I took a break when I was pregnant. I still get an outbreak probably once a year - and when it happens I can clearly link it to stress and/or excessive alcohol (holidays are a typical time - romantic break because we are a bit overworked and stressed, too much to drink, oh yeah...)

If I get sufficient warning (in my case my left knee tells me! funny eh, nerve clusters etc) I take a 1000mg of valacyclovir three times a day and that can either knock it down completely, so I get no external symptoms (i.e. no blister, just neuropathy in knee), or in the worst case, will at least reduce the blister from a 7 day mess to a 2 day pimple. Get your GP to prescribe a course of treatment to have in the cupboard so that you can get straight onto it if you have the feeling of an outbreak coming on.

If it is any consolation, I have never passed it on. I have never been rejected because of it, am on husband number 2 and he just thinks it's a shame that it happens to me. I struggle with shame and self loathing when I do get an outbreak and I really need to get a handle on that!

@Hereweka please don’t think me rude but I have a question - I have Herpes as well but I’ve not been in a relationship since diagnosis so I’ve not had that conversation. I was going to tell a potential partner straight away (so not to waste their time or get rejected down the line etc) but my friend says not to but I wouldn’t want to deceive anyone. Can I ask when you told your husband? Before or after the festivities?

I know very VERY well when I am going to have an outbreak. You will be told a lot about asymptomatic shedding and how we are a risk all of the time. This is not my experience (and if it was I think more people would have herpes).

So, I am able to know in advance if I am going to be a risk. There are some who would say that is reckless of me, that I shoud confess my sins before I take my knickers off. That has not been my experience and I have never passed it on.

This means that I have been able to start a casual relationship (who knows where this is going...) and not tell.

Once I think that this is someone who I would like to tell, trust with this information, then I will tell them. I feel that this is really personal information and not something that I would want to tell just anyone - you could say, well you shouldn't be having sex with just anyone, but I have had this since I was 19 and never passed it on. I am now nearly 60! My husbands knew early on and still decided to have children and marriages with me. I have had other significant relationships where I have told them early on and it just hasn't been an issue - I mean it is scary when you have to have the conversation, but no one has been bothered (either I have met smart emotionally intelligent men, or they have been too dim to understand or maybe I am so hot and sexy they just didn't care...?)

@Herewekai absolutely love that answer. Thank you.
I told a guy once on a third date because he kept pressuring me to do it without and I explained why I don’t want to it without a condom and he didn’t call me back. So I feel as if not to get hurt I should tell them quite soon as to not be ghosted like that but I guess the right one won’t care if I do have it.

When people can not show symptoms for years, or ever, how do you know you haven’t passed it on?

A friend of mine contracted it from someone who, like you, decided he didn’t need to tell anyone until he trusted them, lol at the irony there, because he was confident he wouldn’t pass it on when not having an outbreak himself. He did pass it on to my friend and she is was one the unlucky ones that has had a lot of outbreaks.

She has had to have counselling because she felt so violated that he didn’t tell her and it was such a shock when she got it. It was the deliberate secrecy that she struggled to deal with more than the herpes itself, and she has found it very difficult to trust anyone since. At one point she felt her life wasn’t worth living, although thankfully she is past that now, but she still feels very strongly about people disclosing this information before any sort of sexual relationship starts.

It’s a really shitty thing not to tell someone before you are intimate with them.

thanks for the support @Hereweka. I’m married with children and told my DH before we had sex 11 years ago, but I still have the absolute fear of passing it on to him.

Im on day 3 of the antivirals today and the sunburn prodrome feeling is slightly better, so I’m hoping they will work for me continuously and I can have a normal sex life. My husband has the patience of a saint!

I’m also unaware of when I contracted this disease. But I was diagnosed in my early twenties.

I think you need to tell someone before any sort of sex. People can make their own decisions then and act accordingly.

I agree OP, which is why I posted in response to the pp awful view that it’s ok not to disclose.

No advice OP, other than to say please try not to feel embarrassed. I wish you well and I hope your symptoms go away or at least become less frequent again. 💐

@soembarassing1I definitely think I will tell the guy even in the talking stages. I’m absolutely afraid of getting to know them and developing feelings for them only for me to disclose my status and they go off me.

Thanks @StarsBeginningToFade

Hopeful bump